If you just want to experiment with Django, skip ahead to the next
section; Django includes a lightweight web server you can use for
testing, so you won’t need to set up Apache until you’re ready to
deploy Django in production.

If you want to use Django on a production site, use Apache with
mod_wsgi. mod_wsgi operates in one of two modes: embedded
mode or daemon mode. In embedded mode, mod_wsgi is similar to
mod_perl – it embeds Python within Apache and loads Python code into
memory when the server starts. Code stays in memory throughout the
life of an Apache process, which leads to significant performance
gains over other server arrangements. In daemon mode, mod_wsgi spawns
an independent daemon process that handles requests. The daemon
process can run as a different user than the Web server, possibly
leading to improved security. The daemon process can be restarted
without restarting the entire Apache Web server, possibly making
refreshing your codebase more seamless. Consult the mod_wsgi
documentation to determine which mode is right for your setup. Make
sure you have Apache installed with the mod_wsgi module activated.
Django will work with any version of Apache that supports mod_wsgi.

If you can’t use mod_wsgi for some reason, fear not: Django supports many other
deployment options. One is uWSGI; it works
very well with nginx. Additionally, Django follows the WSGI spec
(PEP 3333), which allows it to run on a variety of server platforms.

If you plan to use Django’s database API functionality, you’ll need to make
sure a database server is running. Django supports many different database
servers and is officially supported with PostgreSQL, MariaDB, MySQL, Oracle
and SQLite.

If you are developing a small project or something you don’t plan to deploy in
a production environment, SQLite is generally the best option as it doesn’t
require running a separate server. However, SQLite has many differences from
other databases, so if you are working on something substantial, it’s
recommended to develop with the same database that you plan on using in
production.

If you’re using an unofficial 3rd party backend, please consult the
documentation provided for any additional requirements.

If you plan to use Django’s manage.pymigrate command to automatically
create database tables for your models (after first installing Django and
creating a project), you’ll need to ensure that Django has permission to create
and alter tables in the database you’re using; if you plan to manually create
the tables, you can grant Django SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE and
DELETE permissions. After creating a database user with these permissions,
you’ll specify the details in your project’s settings file, see
DATABASES for details.

If you’re using Django’s testing framework to test
database queries, Django will need permission to create a test database.

Installation instructions are slightly different depending on whether you’re
installing a distribution-specific package, downloading the latest official
release, or fetching the latest development version.

Install pip. The easiest is to use the standalone pip installer. If your
distribution already has pip installed, you might need to update it if
it’s outdated. If it’s outdated, you’ll know because installation won’t
work.

Take a look at venv. This tool provides
isolated Python environments, which are more practical than installing
packages systemwide. It also allows installing packages without
administrator privileges. The contributing tutorial walks through how to create a virtual environment.

After you’ve created and activated a virtual environment, enter the command:

Check the distribution specific notes to see if
your platform/distribution provides official Django packages/installers.
Distribution-provided packages will typically allow for automatic installation
of dependencies and supported upgrade paths; however, these packages will rarely
contain the latest release of Django.

If you decide to use the latest development version of Django,
you’ll want to pay close attention to the development timeline,
and you’ll want to keep an eye on the release notes for the
upcoming release. This will help you stay
on top of any new features you might want to use, as well as any changes
you’ll need to make to your code when updating your copy of Django.
(For stable releases, any necessary changes are documented in the
release notes.)

If you’d like to be able to update your Django code occasionally with the
latest bug fixes and improvements, follow these instructions:

Make sure that you have Git installed and that you can run its commands
from a shell. (Enter githelp at a shell prompt to test this.)

Check out Django’s main development branch like so:

$ git clone https://github.com/django/django.git

This will create a directory django in your current directory.

Make sure that the Python interpreter can load Django’s code. The most
convenient way to do this is to use a virtual environment and pip. The
contributing tutorial walks through how to
create a virtual environment.

After setting up and activating the virtual environment, run the following
command:

$ python -m pip install -e django/

This will make Django’s code importable, and will also make the
django-admin utility command available. In other words, you’re all
set!

When you want to update your copy of the Django source code, run the command
gitpull from within the django directory. When you do this, Git will
download any changes.